| |
| SO you have lost your keen Italian craft— | |
| You, sir, with the pale-blue steady eyes. | |
| The restless liquids changing in a wink, | |
| The elemental catch-and-cling, the flames, | |
| The quiet cultures hatching hour by hour— | 5 |
| All these are not the secret Kiss-of-Death? | |
| You do not follow me? It’s just as well— | |
| I only muse on fashions of your trade. | |
| For you, the present mode’s enough; for you | |
| The rose-red liquor of the Borgia’s feast, | 10 |
| The ointment on the blade at Elsinore, | |
| The cobra-touch of the Byzantine ring— | |
| Crude things they seem, I take it, in your eyes…… | |
| And yet they had their midnight will of life. | |
| |
| But you have lost the pose, the furtive air. | 15 |
| That devilish old theatric charlatan | |
| Had much the better of you, sir, in style. | |
| This same clear glass—he used it for a gaze | |
| That hoped to glimpse the cloudy shape of Fate. | |
| You spread a drop upon a slide; stain it | 20 |
| Some hue that pierces evil things alone— | |
| (Magic in that? A little, if you like)— | |
| And balance in its groove this paltry drop. | |
| The light gleams through it to the lens above. | |
| No, I can’t look, sir……It’s my life, you know. | 25 |
| Give me a moment. Let me prattle on. | |
| What’s this? And this? Grave issues, every one. | |
| This tells you if a beam of ribboned steel | |
| Will hold some daring tower against the sky. | |
| These tubes?—the milk tests: ah, the little lives | 30 |
| That hang in peril till you mark them safe. | |
| And this?—a matter of your own research. | |
| You are still curious? A mere chance, you think— | |
| I understand. Into the springs of life, | |
| The primal secrets and the hidden wells, | 35 |
| You peer when trade is dull. You tear apart | |
| The final atoms in their whirling dance, | |
| And trust they may not find their way again. | |
| The mind of God is swift……And so is Death. | |
| |
| No, sir, not yet. The first look must be mine. | 40 |
| How should it stand? If the round discs are clear— | |
| Fair winds, and hope, and lengthening days, you say? | |
| Good! Fear, sir, is a grisly thing to feel. | |
| If they be tinged with violet, then the plague— | |
| The pale, slow plague—is rotting out my life. | 45 |
| Suppose I dash the thing aside, and slay | |
| The messenger of evil ere he speak? | |
| No, no!—a moment more. That was my Fear | |
| Who sometimes cries before I crush him down. | |
| Now I will know……The violet shade, you say, | 50 |
| Is the death sign; the white is innocent. | |
| Well, now the hoary wings of doom are poised | |
| Above me, and I feel their fluttering…… | |
| Tomorrow, and the fostering sun, the flowers, | |
| The kisses and the songs, the green spring roads, | 55 |
| And all my soul’s new fortunes and desires, | |
| Tremble across this disc of light. Ah, God! | |
| Some brandy! Sweet Life! The glass is clear. | |
| |
